Come Join SunMed's Charity Jogathon!

This coming May, in conjunction with Better Hearing and Speech Month, Sunway Medical Centre is organizing SunMed Jogathon 2011! Proceeds from the event will be channeled to the Children's Wish Society of Malaysia (CWS). It is a society that grants a terminally ill child's last wish. To find out more about the society, check it out here.

Back to the event, so come one come all! It's for a good cause, and you'll get to burn that much-needed fat that you're dying to rid off (I know I do). In addition, for each registration you'll be entitled with race kits! So what are you waiting for, register now! Click here for there registration form.

Noise Induced Hearing Loss Awareness Campaign

Audiologists at Speech & Hearing Centre, Sunway Medical Centre will be having a booth over at the Sunway University Open Day this Sunday, 13th March, from 1pm to 5pm. They'll be doing a noise induced hearing loss awareness campaign, so if you're in the neighbourhood, do drop by! Information and goodies await! :D

Remarks from Hearing Aid Clients

Throughout my working experience doing trial hearing aids and fitting them, I've heard remarks that really amused (and some, still amuses) me. So now I decided, whenever I hear an interesting statement, I will put it up in this post.

Was trying on different range of hearing aids. As I revealed the price, the client was shocked to hear the figure. Although he admits the benefit, he left the clinic with a remark, "If I lived a different life, I would get the more expensive hearing aid". I always, always, always hate it when cost is the barrier to a better quality of life :(

Client came in, very motivated to wear hearing aid. When he first tried it, he can really feel the benefit that he exclaimed, "I feel like Superman! Fantastic!" Seriously, I've never had that enthusiastic of a client before, so his feedback really made me happy that I was able to help him.

An elderly man came for hearing aid fitting. He has a prosthetic leg made in Denmark. In the clinic, he chose a hearing aid from Denmark as well. Following fitting, I cleverly said to him, "So you're half Danish now" The joke brought laughter from the client and his son. :D Not exactly client's remark, but still, the theme is: amusing! (got the idea from my colleague, hehe)

More remarks to come!

A Hearing System in Your Mouth?!

Can't believe what you're seeing? Believe it.

SoundBite, the latest innovation of a hearing device. See below article to find out more. The things people come up with. I wonder how comfortable it is to wear. Because whenever you have something on your teeth, it's never comfortable~ for me that is. I hated my dentist visits with a passion!

And the device is using bone conduction method. So will the teeth vibrate when the microphone picks up the sound? I seriously could not imagine!

SoundBite In-the-Mouth Hearing System Is FDA Cleared for Single-Sided Deafness | February 3, 2011 | The Insider | The Hearing Review | Hearing Review Products

The Simpsons: the Episode that Bart went Deaf?!

Was flipping the channels on tv when I settled on the Simpsons. It has been a while since I last watched an episode, so it was "fate" that I watched this particular episode. It was "The Donkey Basketball Game" (I have no idea what that is) episode. Tried to find the episode on youtube but couldn't. If anyone finds it, let me know okay?

Anyway, in the episode, Bart was not hearing well, or "deaf" as the rest of the Simpsons said. Homer and Marge brought him to see Dr. Hibbert - at the roadside, mind you. Dr. Hibbert took out his otoscope and saw that there's a swelling inside Bart's ear. He told Homer and Marge to give it a day and it will resolve on its own. So Bart went through the rest of the day, not hearing anything except white noise (that's what they showed, really!) which of course resulted in laugh-out-loud moments for me . He managed to be not bullied because he didn't respond to the bullies (he couldn't hear what they wanted!) and the funniest part for me was when the Simpsons had dinner later that day.

Marge was saying she wanted Bart to stay home from school the next day since he hasn't recovered. Bart disagreed because he wanted to watch the Donkey Basketball Game. Homer, whom kept asking Bart to pass this dish and that but didn't get any because Bart couldn't hear it, retorted something like, "Donkey Basketball Game? Now i've heard everything! (looking at Bart) Unlike you!" He laughed out and realized Bart didn't hear that remark and said to the rest of the family "Everybody remember that when he got his hearing back". LOL!

Bart did got his hearing back but of course at the expense of the Simpsons being labeled as unpatriotic. Anyway, the episode was hilarious, as always. But of course, the facts are not right! I'm not sure what type of hearing problem Bart had but it sure wouln't have caused him to go deaf! A bit of hard of hearing, yes, but not total deafness! Especially when's the swelling was only on one side of the ear! And that it can recover on it's own without anything!

But hey, they're doing it for laughs, so like Lenka sings, "Just enjoy the show~" Don't ask for your money back though! :D

Happy Lunar New Year!

To those celebrating, have a prosperous rabbit year ahead!

Careful with the fireworks, you don't want any acoustic trauma or noise-induced hearing loss to celebrate the year with!

Happy holidays to all :)

Hearing & Hormones

I haven't gotten the chance to look up on this... so here's a quickie:

Does menopause affects hearing levels???

Please do share if you know anything about this :)

Laugh-A-Minute

Something light for a stressful week.
A man feared his wife wasn't hearing as well as she used to and he thought she might need a hearing aid.

Not quite sure how to approach her, he called the family Doctor to discuss the problem.

The Doctor told him there is a simple informal test the husband could perform to give the doctor a better idea about her hearing loss.

"Here's what you do," said the Doctor, "stand about 15 metres away from her, and in a normal conversational speaking tone see if she hears you. If not, go to 10 metres away, then 7 metres , and so on until you get a response."

That evening, the wife is in the kitchen cooking dinner, and he was in the den. He stood about 15 metres away, and in a normal tone he asks, 'Honey, what's for dinner?"

No response.

So the husband moves closer to the kitchen, about 10 metres away from his wife and repeats, "Honey, what's for dinner?"

Still no response. Next he moves into the dining room where he is about 7 metres from his wife and asks, "Honey, what's for dinner?"

Again he gets no response. So, he walks up to the kitchen door, about 3 metres away.
"Honey, what's for dinner?" He hears nothing.

So he walks right up behind her. "Honey, what's for dinner?"

(Wait for it....)

"Ahmed, for the fifth blooming time, CHICKEN!"

:D

thanks to EBI Lockhat of South African National Halaal Authority

Can You Please Test My 3 Year-Old with AABR?

In my heart, I was like, "WHAT?!"

An aunty innocently asked me to do so recently. It was quite funny, really.

A baby was referred for hearing screening from an external hospital. The baby was brought in wide awake, so I advised the mother to put her to sleep. While waiting, I ushered the other family members who towed along to the lounge area. They were the maternal grandparents and 3 year-old nephew. As we were walking I noticed the boy vocalizing jargons. I began asking the grandmother questions. She reported that he's still not speaking a word yet. I told her she (and the child's working parents!) should be concerned with his speech development. So I went on and on about children development and the appropriate assessments needed. I even advised for a hearing test to be done, but granny wanted to talk it over with the child's parents first, which was fairly expected.

Back to the baby girl. Wow, she was really curious with the place. She looked so obviously sleepy but was still looking around the room. At one time, we thought she had fallen asleep, but she woke up at the slightest touch! The mother decided to take her out of the room and settle her down. As I wanted to leave the testing room, suddenly the granny rushed in carrying her sleeping grandson. She wanted me to test her boy with AABR that instant! I was shocked for a second, then quickly recovered by explaining to the granny that the test is designed for babies. Briefly I told her that her grandson needs to be assessed with a behavioral test, and if that is not successful, then only we test with a diagnostic sleeping test. She looked kind of disappointed with my explanation but accepted it anyways.

The baby later on slept and passed the AABR test. The family went back, happy with the result. Hopefully I'll hear from the granny about her grandson soon!

Funny start for the new year.

Happy 2011 y'all! :)

Pekak?

taken from the Malay Mail 15th December 2010

RM1k fine for threatening SMS

KUALA LUMPUR: All it took was an SMS to turn two best friends into enemies.
A despatch rider was fined RM1,000 by the Kuala Lumpur magistrate's court here this morning for sending a threatening SMS to his former best friend.
Magistrate Zulkipli Abdullah said Mohd Rizal Ahmad Zailan, 30, faces a one-month jail term in default of payment.
Mohd Rizal, better known as "Pekak"(deaf) to his friends as he uses a hearing aid, pleaded guilty to the charge of committing criminal intimidation against Mohd Khairul Shafri Abdul Aziz, 26.
On April 16, 2008, Mohd Khairul had sought compensation from Mohd Rizal, claiming the latter had stolen a handphone belonging to Mohd Khairul's sibling.
Mohd Rizal had refused to pay. On April 28, 2008, Mohd Rizal sent a threatening SMS to Mohd Khairul saying: "Don't be arrogant. You just watch, I will kill you... I will come quietly."
Mohd Rizal asked for a lighter sentence as his wife is five-months pregnant and he also has a one-year-old child.

I put up this article because of the labeling. It is really so easy but terrible for people to label people with disabilities. These kind of people should be thankful that God blesses them with a fully normally functional body. Not everyone is as lucky as them, but for them to label people, it really makes me mad! I applaud Mohd Rizal for embracing his deafness and wearing a hearing aid (but not his crime!!!). It means he wants to be better and improve his quality of life. Not everyone is brave to do so. Hearing has always been taken for granted and it really should stop now!

For better hearing, always!

Effects of Smoking on Hearing Levels

Still not quitting smoking? Here's another reason why you should stop now!

Extracted from Audiology Online

"A new study conducted in Japan and published online in the journal Toxicology and Industrial Health, found a correlation between hearing loss at 12 kHZ and light smoking in young men. The abstract is provided here; for a copy of the article or a subscription to the journal, please visit tih.sagepub.com/

Title: Effects of light smoking on extra-high-frequency auditory thresholds in young adults

Authors: Nobutaka Ohgami, Takaaki Kondo, Masashi Kato

Abstract: There have been few reports showing a correlation between hearing levels and life style in young people. In this study, we succeeded in sensitively evaluating hearing levels in 51 young male adults of 21-23 years in age by 12 k Hz extra-high-frequency auditory thresholds, which cannot be measured by usual audiometry devices for clinical use. Noise exposure, alcohol consumption and sleeping time did not affect hearing levels in young adults. Auditory thresholds of 12 kHz frequency in smokers were significantly (p < 0.05) higher than those in non-smokers, while there were no differences in 1 kHz, 4 kHz and 8 kHz frequencies of hearing levels between smokers and non-smokers. Since the Brinkman Index (BI; cigarettes/day multiplied by number of years) of smokers in this study was from 12 to 60, our results suggest that even light smoking of less than 20 cigarettes/day for 3 years can result in the development of hearing loss of 12 kHz frequency in young adults. Binary logistic regression analysis again showed a correlation between hearing loss (≥40 dB of auditory thresholds in 12 kHz frequency) and light smoking (12 ≤ BI ≤ 60). Thus, this study showed that auditory threshold at 12 kHz frequency could be a sensitive marker for hearing in young adults. More importantly, we for the first time provided epidemiological evidence that light smoking might affect hearing level at 12 kHz frequency and revealed a new risk of light smoking."

All scientific knowledge and proof (one example as above) show smoking to be harmful, causing not only hearing loss but also the deaths of at least a thousand people each day.

A blog reader, Mr.Ebi Lockhat for South African National Halaal Authority, (thank you very much sir!) has kindly shared below with me. I find it informative to be shared to all as well, since we are talking about smoking.

"Most of the world’s religions regard smoking to be a sin and forbid it. Smoking is undeniably strongly addictive and scientifically proven to be harmful to one’s own health as well as society. It enslaves ones body and can never be described or justified as beneficial.

In Christianity, the Bible commands its adherents not to allow their bodies to become "mastered" by anything. "Everything is permissible for me—but not everything is beneficial. Everything is permissible for me—but I will not be mastered by anything" (Corinthians 6:12).

In Judaism, some Rabbis have ruled that since the dangers of smoking are known it is forbidden to smoke. They point to several biblical concerns such as "take heed to thyself and take care of thy life” (Deuteronomy 4:9)

Of smoking by Hindus, Swami Amarananda of the Hindu Centre of Geneva, says, "tobacco is traditionally seen as a vyasana or an unhealthy dependence. So a vyasana matches ill with a spiritual life."

Smoking and drug taking is banned in Sikhism and using tobacco is listed in the Sikh Rehit Maryada (Code of Conduct) as one of the four transgression (Kurahits).

Islam as the Final Revelation to mankind has condemned smoking and Muslim Jurists have ruled it to be either Makruh (detested and undesirable) or Haraam (forbidden) on the basis of causing harm to one’s health (Qur'an 2:195 & 4:29), danger to your family's health and the environment (Qur'an 33:58), inconvenience, harm and discomfort to others (Hadith), waste of money (Qur'an 17:26-27) and possible ingestion of Haraam ingredients (Quran 7:157).

And uniquely, it has also provided a perfect lifetime training regimen with the institution of the annual thirty day Fasting in the month of Ramadaan where Muslims cannot partake of any food, drink or a quick puff from dawn to dusk, the most crucial time of craving for a smoker. Observations have shown that even the heaviest of smokers will never compromise their fasting for the nicotine fix. For a start, set Ramadhan, as your quit date and let your body, family and friends rediscover the healthy you, smoke –free and recharged by the blessings of the Mubarak month of Ramadan, InshaAllah (God willing).

Useful tips

1. Take a calm look at the facts on smoking, the costs and its harmful effects on your body. Consult this regularly to reaffirm your determination to quit.

(Click here for articles and cost calculator):
http://www.sanha.org.za/flashnews/flashn37.htm
http://www.sanha.org.za/flashnews/flashn38.htm
Cigarette calculator

2. If possible rope in family and friends who also want to quit so that you can support each other.

3. Do not hesitate to seek help from your Doctor or Imam who by training and inclination will support you.

4. Change your lifestyle with exercise, a new hobby and frequenting the Masjid daily.

5. Download or write for your free copy of the booklet “Kicking the Habit” by Moulana Yunus Patel Saheb."

Quit smoking now - The butt stops here.

This is a public service announcement ;)